POLPOP is a cross-national project that studies how politicians evaluate and deal with public opinion. Every three-to-four years, POLPOP researchers conduct face-to-face surveys with national politicians, and online surveys of representative samples of citizens in participating countries. Data from these surveys are used to analyse the accuracy of politicians’ perceptions of public opinion, the congruence between politicians and citizens’ views, and politicians' perceptions and behavior more generally.
Each iteration of the project has a slightly different focus. While POLPOP I mainly focused on the accuracy of politicians’ estimates of public opinion, POLPOP II predominantly dealt with politicians' evaluation of public opinion signals and inequality. The fieldwork for POLPOP III is being conducted in 2025 and will further explore politicians’ evaluation of public opinion using innovative experimental methods, and will study politicians' perceptions of the malleability of public opinion.
